disability

English

Examples

In the medical model of disability, using a wheelchair for paraplegia is a disability conceived as a medical condition, but in the social model of disability, the paraplegia itself is the impairment, the mobility barriers are an instance of inaccessibility, and whether or not the person has a disability might depend on whose terminology is being used. Similarly, by this measure, not everyone with autism has a disability.

Etymology

Circa 1570 disable +‎ -ity.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /dɪsəˈbɪlɪti/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

Noun

disability (countable and uncountable, plural disabilities)

1. (countable, medical model of disability) A condition characterised by a significant limitation in a person's physical or intellectual powers or ability.

   Synonym: (dated) handicap

   people with disabilities

   • 1834–1874, George Bancroft, History of the United States, from the Discovery of the American Continent, volume (please specify |volume=I to X), Boston, Mass.: Little, Brown and Company [et al.], →OCLC:

     Chatham refused to see him, pleading his disability. The King himself intervened by a letter […] Chatham yielded to such persuasion; though suffering from a universal tremor.

2. (uncountable) The state of having such a condition; the state of being disabled.

   Synonyms: disabledness, (in certain contexts) incapacity

   Antonyms: ability, able-bodiedness

   • 1992, Joan C. Cornoni-Huntley et al., “Epidemiology of disability in the oldest old”, in The Oldest Old, page 278:

     While physical and sensory disability is usually identified by asking a subject what he or she can or cannot do (with or without assistance), cognitive disability is assessed with a test such as a mental status questionnaire (MSQ).

3. (countable, social model of disability) A limitation in function (the things that a person can do or achieve) that is driven by any combination of their impairments (the medical facts about them) and the imperfect state of society's inaccessibility that sometimes fails to accommodate their needs.

   Synonym: handicap (dated)

   Coordinate terms: inaccessibility; impairment

4. (countable, obsolete) Inability.

   Synonym: impotence

   • 1644, J[ohn] M[ilton], The Doctrine or Discipline of Divorce: […], 2nd edition, London: [s.n.], →OCLC, book:

     Grossest faults, or disabilities to perform what was covenanted.

5. (countable, law) Lack of legal qualification to do something; legal incapacity or incompetency.

   Synonym: disqualification

   Antonyms: capacity, competency, qualification

6. (uncountable, informal) Regular payments received by a disabled person, usually from the state.

   Synonym: disability benefits

   I had to go on disability after the accident.

   Did you get your disability this month?

Derived terms

• antidisability
• cognitive disability
• developmental disability
• disability-adjusted life year
• disability sport
• I have a disability
• intellectual disability
• learning disability
• multidisabilities
• multidisability
• neurodisability
• pan-disability
• predisability
• print disability

 

Related terms

• disable
• disabled
• disablism

Translations

state of being disabled

• Armenian: հաշմանդամություն (hy) (hašmandamutʻyun)
• Bulgarian: инвалидност (bg) f (invalidnost)
• Catalan: discapacitat (ca) f
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 殘廢 / 残废 (zh) (cánfèi), 殘疾 / 残疾 (zh) (cánjí), 殘障 / 残障 (zh) (cánzhàng)

• Finnish: vammaisuus (fi)
• Georgian: ინვალიდობა (invalidoba)
• German: Behinderung (de) f
• Hindi: विकलांगता (viklāṅgtā), अक्षमता (hi) (akṣamtā)
• Hungarian: mozgáskorlátozottság, mozgássérültség, fogyatékkal élés, (dated) rokkantság (hu), (possibly offensive) fogyatékosság (hu)
• Indonesian: disabilitas (id)
• Japanese: 障害 (ja) (しょうがい, shōgai)
• Kazakh: мүгедектік (mügedektık)
• Korean: 장애(障礙) (ko) (jang'ae)
• Lithuanian: neįgalumas m
• Macedonian: попреченост f (poprečenost)
• Malayalam: വികലത (ml) (vikalata)
• Maori: hauātanga
• Romanian: dizabilitate f
• Sanskrit: रपस् (sa) n (rapas)
• Serbo-Croatian: onesposobljenost f
• Thai: ความพิการ (th) (kwaam-pí-gaan)
• Turkish: engellilik (tr)

mental condition

• Finnish: häiriö (fi), toimintakyvyn haitta
• Hungarian: értelmi fogyatékosság

legal incapacity or incompetency

• Bulgarian: неправоспособност (bg) f (nepravosposobnost)
• Czech: invalidita (cs) f, postižení (cs) n
• Finnish: vajaavaltaisuus, oikeustoimikelvottomuus
• French: invalidité (fr) f
• German: Invalidität (de) f
• Hungarian: jogképesség hiánya, akadályoztatás (hu)
• Portuguese: incompetência (pt) f
• Romanian: handicap (ro) n
• Russian: неправоспосо́бность (ru) f (nepravosposóbnostʹ)
• Serbo-Croatian: invalidnost (sh) f, invaliditet (sh) m
• Spanish: incapacidad (es) f
• Turkish: sakatlık (tr)

regular payments received by a disabled person

• Czech: invalidní důchod m
• Finnish: vammaiseläke, työkyvyttömyyseläke (fi)
• French: pension d’invalidité f
• Hungarian: rokkantnyugdíj (hu)
• Polish: renta (pl) f
• Russian: посо́бие по инвали́дности n (posóbije po invalídnosti)
• Serbo-Croatian: invalidska penzija f, invalidska mirovina f

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Translations to be checked

• Macedonian: ^{(please verify)} неспособност f (nesposobnost), ^{(please verify)} инвалидите́т m (invaliditét)
• Manx: ^{(please verify)} anheiltys m
• Turkish: ^{(please verify)} sakatlık (tr)